Food Sharing Workshop

On Saturday, May 9th, Community Outreach of Our United Villages hosted a free Food Sharing workshop. 50 people attended the workshop and spent the day engaged in their choice of one service or skill building project. As a group, everyone reconvened to share lunch and reflections. Each project group reported back on insights gained, skills learned, and their most inspiring moments from the day. Below is a video of the day compiled by a volunteer videographer, Doug Adler. For more information and resources that were handed out at the workshop visit www.ourunitedvillages.org/foodsharing.html

Cultural Sharing Conversation

On Thursday, April 9, 16 people gathered in the conference room of Our United Villages to share mementos, photos and stories of their way of life, family traditions and cultural background. Here are excerpts of their stories:

Upcoming: Community Outreach Food Sharing Workshop

Interested in gardening, cooking, gleaning, preserving or harvesting? Come learn new food sharing skills. Take a cooking class. Watch a canning demonstration. Volunteer at a garden or urban farm. Learn to identify urban edibles.

Meet at the Whole Foods Market Wellness Center (3535 NE 15th Avenue, 97212) at 9:00 am for a light breakfast and to pick your project. Lunch will also be provided. Childcare, transportation, and interpretation available upon request.

Please register by May 4th by calling 503.546.7499 or click here!

What do you do to be a supportive neighbor?

These inspirational stories come from neighbors who have found enriching experiences in the act of reaching out. What do you do to be a supportive neighbor?

Carpooling & Sharing Your Abundance with Neighbors

"I live in the Woodstock Neighborhood and know many of my neighbors. If I am ever running to the grocery store, I invite my 75-year-old neighbor to go along. I have known her since I was 3 years old. My grandparents raised my mom, aunt, and uncle in the same intersection that we live in. Going to the store has become a fun social outing instead of a dull shopping errand. She enjoys getting a ride, getting out, and catching up. We share our abundance with our neighbors. Whenever we have too much of something, like fruit, bakery items, or home-grown veggies, we bring the extra to our immediate neighbors. I was making cookies for a gathering and realized I was out of oatmeal. I went running across the street to borrow a couple of cups from my neighbor. A car passed by and probably thought “look at that lady running with a measuring cup in her PJs,” but that is what I like about our relationship. We aren’t just neighbors, we are family!"

-Woodstock Neighbor

Learning Customs and Making Friends
"We tell our children that it is very important to have friends and be nice to others. Our neighbors can also be our friends. In our culture, there is a statement: it is needed to rely on your relatives first, then your neighbors secondly. Some of us are fortunate enough to live by our relatives, but we all have neighbors next door. I watch over my son and our neighbor’s son while they play outside. I encourage them to play ball together and to get to know each other’s customs. They have both learned about each other’s New Year’s traditions. I believe that it is a good value to have respect toward different cultures. I learned that my neighbor has the same expectations as mine towards our children’s education, behavior, and health. We are not so much different as we thought. "
- Portland Neighbor

If you would like to share your story about being a supportive neighbor, email us! Read more inspirational stories at our website!

Working Together: Turning Ideas Into Action

On Saturday, February 7th 23 individuals from around the Portland area gathered at Euphoria Studios to turn ideas into action. In December and January Community Outreach hosted 5 Community Conversations called Working Together through Challenging Times. Out of all the ideas shared at these conversations, 6 themes emerged: Food Sharing, Celebrating Multicultural Community, Sharing Resources, Environmental Sustainability, Good News, and Neighborhood Activities.

Using an Idea Development Plan groups worked together on ideas based on their common interests. They created a blueprint for their project idea including a purpose, vision and first steps.

We share their project ideas as inspiring examples of people working together. If you are interested in any of the projects, please let Community Outreach know and we can connect you directly with the groups.

Food Sharing

Food sharing as a community interest is growing. 4 people focused on increasing access to local food for hungry residents and created a project called, “Neighborhood Food Outreach Model”. The purpose of their project is to create networks of self-sufficiency based around food on a neighborhood level. This could include cultural food nights, garden swapping, or community composting. Each neighborhood’s network would be distinct--based on the community--and may take on a specific location for gathering or be an informal resource. The group's first step is to evaluate personal and neighborhood resources for creating food networks. Eventually they would like to have a model that they could present to neighborhoods throughout the city. To get involved in this group, email info@ourunitedvillages.org.

Celebrating Multicultural Community

Storytelling was on this group's mind as they brainstormed ways to celebrate multicultural community. They desired to create a “tool-kit” to encourage personal and collective storytelling events in order to connect with neighbors and “encourage minority voices to be heard.” “Spicing the Stew: Encouraging Personal Storytelling to Connect Communities” will be a resource that neighborhood associations and organizations can use in their communities. The first step of this group is to begin researching similar projects and to compile additional resources from the community. To get involved with this group email info@ourunitedvillages.org

Neighborhood Activities

Shared activities can bring neighbors together and build community. This group began by creating a plan for hosting a neighborhood craft night where individuals could work on their own projects in a supportive environment. Additional community service projects could be taken on by the group such as “making Christmas stockings for homeless and low-income youth.” “Craft Night” would allow neighbors and friends to socialize while also accomplishing personal goals. The first step of this group is to identify interested friends and neighbors. To get involved with this group email info@ourunitedvillages.org

Sharing Resources

Have you ever had a bad day and needed someone to talk to? This group decided to create a network for emotional support that would link people having a good day with people having a bad day throughout the city. “Neighborability” would be a peer-to-peer support network that is non-judgmental and serves to connect people. Interested individuals could sign up in acknowledgment of their own life experiences to support community. This group hopes that this project will raise the visibility of everyone’s own resources to support each other. Their first step is to find an existing infrastructure to connect with. To get involved with this group email info@ourunitedvillages.org

Environmental Sustainability

“Sustainability, Economy and You” was the project envisioned by this group to bridge the information gap and engage a broader and more diverse audience in issues of sustainability. This group recognized that currently information about sustainability or the economy is not communicated in terms of personal relevance. They want to create an “official comprehensive community resource information sheet”. This would compile existing information in an easy to understand format. Their first step is to research existing resources and decide which ones to include in the information sheet. To get involved with this group email info@ourunitedvillages.org

To read more about these projects, download resource handouts on the various topics or get involved with one of the groups please visit our website.

Share Your Story: Snow Angel

Community Outreach believes that neighborhoods that recognize the strengths, talents, and resources of each individual create a healthier, more vibrant community. We share inspirational stories and experiences of people working together to inspire others. If you have an inspirational story that you would like to submit, please email it to info@ourunitedvillages.org for consideration. Please enjoy the following story, submitted anonymously to Community Outreach of Our United Villages.

Snow Angel

We are from the Midwest, so when the snow came, it was no big thing to us. We still got out of the house everyday and though the roads were slippery, we had them mostly to ourselves. Our next door neighbors are elders and we hadn’t seen their car move in days. We checked in with them and it turned out that they were almost out of food. They drafted a detailed shopping list: “…the generic brand of breakfast cereal bars, 2% milk, the pepperoni pizza that comes in the yellow box.” They were grateful for the help, but more than that, we were excited for the opportunity to contribute. When we got back, we thought about ways that we could help some of our other elderly neighbors.

The woman kiddy-corner from us just wanted to know if she should bother getting her garbage out to the corner. Seeing as though the garbage vehicles weren’t out and about, we asked if there was anything else that she needed. “Why don’t you stop by later for tea.” Wanting companionship is the easiest need to fill. We swapped a few stories and devoured the delicious cornbread she had whipped up.

Back in the Midwest you can be fined for not removing the snow in a timely manner—so we were on it. We threw on our snowpants and gloves, and armed with leaf rake and dirt shovel we started clearing our neighbors’ walkways, steps, and driveways. As we were finishing the next door neighbor’s driveway, he opened the door wearing a cozy fleece robe, spicy hot chocolate in hand. Then we moved onto the neighbor who lives kiddy-corner. After laying salt on her very icy steps, she opened the door and said “I think I might have a shovel in the attic- wanna take a look?” When we were equipped with the proper tool, we were rearing to go. We asked if it would be alright to go down to Mary’s house, who lives about a block down. She responded “Please do…last I heard her furnace was out and she hasn’t answered the phone. Find out if the repair man has come.”

As we had started shoveling Mary’s walkway and steps, she peeked her towel-wrapped head out the door, saying “No…no…please don’t do that…what are you doing?” I let her know that it was just a neighborly thing to do and we would stop if she wanted us to, but were happy to help. “Well, I just…well you don’t have to do such a good job.” Mary has a rough exterior about her, like she has survived through harsher days. The furnace had been repaired and she had a space heater. We finished up at her house, and moved onto the next neighbor.

About two weeks later, when the snow had melted and the garbage was being picked up again, I opened the front door to bring the bins back up to the house, and who was standing there? Mary. “Well thank god you are home. This is the 4th time I have been over here and if you weren’t home this time, I would have just croaked! I wanted to give you this. If the names are wrong, don’t blame me, blame your neighbor…I didn’t even ask your names.” She started moving back to her daughter’s car, who apparently had driven her down to our house 4 times to try and give us a card. She said, “I want you to know that in the 53 years that I have lived here, no one has ever shoveled, racked, or swept my walk. I just couldn’t believe that. You have to come meet my daughter.” After we talked a while, and said goodbye, I went inside to read the card. The first thing I noticed was how beautiful her hand-writing was. “It is so reassuring to know that I have such kind and thoughtful neighbors. Thank you so much for checking on me and for shoveling my walk. It was such a nice surprise to see you two out there, working so hard for me. I wanted you to know how much that touched by heart. Mary”

It was such a lesson to me. I have the desire to help all the time. Sometimes I don’t know what to do. Sometimes I don’t know if the help will be welcomed. Mary’s letter reminded me how simple it is to reach out to those who are around us and the joy that comes in connecting to one another.

Communicating Across Language Barriers

In response to the positive feedback from the first session, Our United Villages Community Outreach is happy to announce another workshop on Communicating Across Language Barriers: Understanding Accents. The workshop will be presented by Judith Wild, a visiting professor at Portland State University, Lewis and Clark College and the Northwest Film and Video Center with 30 years of ESL teaching experience. The workshop will include:

• VIDEOS: Watch and listen to people speak English with accents from around the world.
  
• PRACTICE: Discuss the elements of speech in various languages and practice tuning your ear to understand accents.
  
• INFORMATION: Learn specific characteristics and speech patterns for Russian, Mexican Spanish, Vietnamese, and Mandarin Chinese speakers.
  
• DISCUSSION: Share experiences and identify solutions to increase your awareness of and ability to understand accents.

Click Here to learn more about this and other workshops.
Or RSVP at info@ourunitedvillages.org.